In the continuing, squirming readjustment of the Republican party since the gut punch known as Election 2012, and in a story that’s either completely stunning or pulled from the “why’d it take so long?” vaults, Fox News chief, Roger Ailes, has seen the light and given the boot to crow-eating duo Karl Rove and Dick Morris.

It’s no secret that both Rove and Morris took preposterous punditry to its height during the election – Rove with his infamous post-Ohio “it’s premature!” hissy fit and Morris’ smarmy, smiling, absolute assurances that “Romney will win in a landslide.” In the pre-election culture at Fox News it’s likely everyone would’ve looked away and neither would’ve been called on their crazy. But it’s a new day, the playbook has changed, and this one says both were wrong, both made the boss look bad, both are gone.

Stunning and “why’d it take so long?”

New York Magazine reports that given the new, somewhat chagrined post-election atmosphere at Fox News, it’s time for “freshening story lines – and in some cases, changing the characters”:

According to multiple Fox sources, Ailes has issued a new directive to his staff: He wants the faces associated with the election off the air — for now. For Karl Rove and Dick Morris — a pair of pundits perhaps most closely aligned with Fox’s anti-Obama campaign — Ailes’s orders mean new rules. Ailes’s deputy, Fox News programming chief Bill Shine, has sent out orders mandating that producers must get permission before booking Rove or Morris.

In other words, gentlemen, you are no longer needed.

Likely they’ll find other pulpits, other soapboxes; other carnivals at which to bark, probably sooner as opposed to later. But until then the airwaves will seem somehow clearer. Take a deep breath and enjoy. Ahhhhhh.